Not All Neck Injuries Are the Same
Not All Neck Injuries Are the Same
Neck injuries are really common and they can cause a variety of different symptoms. The most obvious is neck pain, but it can also be associated with headache, dizziness, visual problems, and autonomic problems as well.
Neck pain can come from a variety of injuries, and no two injuries are the same, even if it got injured the same way.
The tissues that are injured depend on how the neck was injured, how strong the neck was at baseline, genetic predisposition to inflammation degeneration, age, and history of previous injuries.
Because of that, different tissues can be injured even if the mechanism of injury is the same. These can include:
• Muscles
• Ligaments
• Discs
• Joint capsule or joint cartilage
• Arthritis
• Nerves
This isn’t even mentioning factors like psychological and social factors that contribute to persistent pain responses.
Patients frequently bring in test results from MRI or other imaging hoping that we might be able to help their specific case with upper cervical chiropractic care.
But many of these injuries may not even show up on an a standard MRI.
That’s why we should never take for granted how important it is to actually examine a patient thoroughly with our own eyes and hands.
While imaging may be an important piece of how we take care of someone, we always perform a thorough physical exam of the neck and assess for different neck injuries so we can treat it appropriately, but also know when to refer out.
